Getting Off Key
by Redlance-ck
Summary: When they arrive early for rehearsal, Beca unveils a hidden talent.


**A/N** : Written for Jenn, who gave me the title. Which makes me laugh whenever I think about it.

* * *

They're early. Which is no surprise, considering they'd left forty-five minutes earlier than usual because Chloe had demanded they stop for ice cream before heading to rehearsals and Beca, weak under the bright luminescence of the redhead's hopeful smile, had of course agreed. It works out for both of them because Chloe treats Beca to a cone of her own, which she continually steals licks from as they make their way back. It is an act that Beca would usually grimace at, one she would otherwise find gross, but now only finds the kind of endearing that makes her feel giddy and giggly. And that in itself, she thinks, is pretty gross.

She still just rolls her eyes and smiles when Chloe grabs her hand for the third time, lifting Beca's cone to her mouth and sweeping her tongue across the surface.

The visual doesn't hurt; Chloe in her light, bright sundress, sunglasses pushed up onto the top of her head, smile like the sun. It makes the ice cream feel colder when Beca eventually manages to take another taste, the rest of her body abruptly, unbearably warm beneath the simple tank and thin button down. And Chloe seems to know exactly what she's doing, if her sidelong smirks are anything to go by – Beca's pretty sure they are – which only serves to make Beca warmer and the rehearsal room is practically chilly in comparison when they arrive.

"What time is it?" Beca asks, licking a crumb from the tip of her finger as she drops her bag onto an empty chair and Chloe goes about pulling the whiteboard out and into place.

"There's a clock on the wall," Chloe comments wryly, staring pointedly in the clock's direction. Beca glances up and over at it, then back at Chloe, lifting an eyebrow.

"I didn't ask the clock for the time though, I asked you." Red curls bounce as Chloe shakes her head with a chuckle, flipping the board around as Beca wanders through the gaps in the chairs. She wears her smirk like a tailor-made suit; it's perfect and precise, and so unabashedly Beca that Chloe's heart does a little skip at the sight of it. Every single time.

"Really?" Beca looks back over her shoulder, nodding at Chloe who's wrinkled her nose up and is squinting at her. "Well then, it's ten minutes past the hour." She says primly, pulling a laugh from Beca. The brunette's lazy trek has brought her to the piano sitting at the back of the room and she trails a hand over its closed lid. Aubrey plays and sometimes she runs through songs as they're going over routines. Beca sits down on the bench and lifts the cover hiding the keys. She presses down on one and listens to the way it echoes through the room. She can feel Chloe's eyes on her, watching, absorbing. Her fingers twitch, as though desperate to scratch an itch but mindful of the potential embarrassment it might cause, what with there being an audience. But then she remembers who comprises that audience, and she presses down on that key again, then another, and another, until the fingers of both hands are moving fluidly over the instrument. Teasing out a melody that she unearths from the back of her mind and dusts off with a series of quick, shaky breaths. "I didn't know you could play." It's soft, impossibly so, but Beca still jumps, hands falling still as she twists her head around and up. "Please don't stop." Chloe's there, smiling down at her in that way that Beca can't say no to - which is, she realises, is the same for every one of Chloe's smiles - bright blue eyes shimmering with something like awe. Awe that writes itself across her face like strokes of pain that, somehow, only Beca can see. Then it's her turn to smile, soft and shy, and she drops her gaze back to smooth keys.

"I guess I loved music even when I was really little," she says after a moment and the admission, though aurally quiet, reverberates loudly inside Chloe. "My mom and dad signed me up for piano lessons after I, apparently, saw my cousin play and proceeded to bug the crap out of them for weeks." Chloe chuckles at the mental image as Beca's hands continue to move in rhythmic patterns. She watches them, in between watching Beca's profile, watches the way they arc and stretch, the gentle pressure they apply at just the right time. She presses her hand down against the black top of the piano and turns her body towards Beca. "I kept it up for a long time," she continues, sounding surprised, "I actually liked it, you know? But after my dad left..." She trails off, tipping her head to one side in lieu of a shrug as she continues the melody. "I think I gave up on a lot of stuff. And this," she hits the notes her fingers are poised over a handful of times for emphasis and her mouth stretches into a wide grin when she sees Chloe jump at the unexpected string of sounds, "was one of them." Beca swivels around on the end of the bench until she's facing Chloe, who's expression hasn't quite moved on from startled, and she lifts her hands up, wiggling her fingers. "Full of surprises," she jokes, but the look on Chloe's face suggests she doesn't find it funny.

And then in the time it takes Beca to blink, Chloe is in her lap. Or, more specifically, straddling her lap. She runs her fingers back through Beca's hair, then brings a hand around to sit on either side of her neck, pushing them up until she has Beca's face in her palms. The brunette inhales sharply as her eyes slip shut and Chloe tips her head just enough so that she can catch her lips. The once refreshingly cool air of the room evaporates in an instant, the fire from Chloe's fingertips trickling down Beca's neck and through her chest, where it melts her from the inside out. Her hands drift back down, fisting around the collar of Beca's shirt as Chloe's tongue sweeps across the seam of her lips. There's tension at Beca's shoulders then, as Chloe presses into the kiss and pushes down on the material, and she gets it down to the other girl's elbows before her frustration gets the better of her.

"You should," she pants, cutting herself off, and has to take a breath before she can reassert herself. "Take this off." She tugs again, eyes burning right through Beca, who licks her lips and blinks up at her.

"Why?" It is a pointless, might as well be rhetorical, question. Chloe does not answer and Beca raises both eyebrows. "I am not doing **that** in **here**." Chloe brings her hands back, stroking them over Beca's shoulders, her collarbone, and the swell of flesh laid bare above the neck of her tank top. Chloe doesn't stop until her palms are full, and then, with practised motions, she squeezes. Beca lets out a high, strangled, and immensely undignified groan at the sensation and Chloe's mouth finds her ear.

"I thought you were full of surprises." Chloe's nose bumps her cheekbone as she carefully closes her teeth around pierced flesh and tugs. Beca's hands spasm into talons at Chloe's sides and the noise she makes this time is, they both know, one of failing resolve. Which is beyond crazy, they can't do this **here**. **Now**. Minutes before rehearsal is scheduled to start. Aubrey is **always** here early and, "I want to see what else those fingers can do." Chloe gives one slow roll of her hips.

"Chlo," Beca whines, tipping her head back in defeat as Chloe nudges at her jawline with the curve of her nose and then plasters kisses along the length of her neck.

"Don't you **want** to show me?" Chloe purrs, her voice liquid velvet, her every touch silk as her hands move up once more, and Beca's head swims with it all, breath hitching as the patch of skin hiding her pulse point is sucked at roughly. "I want you to show me," Chloe husks, tracing Beca's jaw with the tip of her finger. The words pull shivers through the brunette, shocking the fine hairs along the back of her neck and tops of her arms into standing on end, and that warmth in her chest melts a path to the apex of her thighs. Pools there like desire and burns through the wires of her nervous system, wrecking the controls beyond repair.

"Get off," Beca grunts, pushing at Chloe until the redhead slips off her lap with a laugh.

"I'm trying-" Beca stands almost at the same moment, shoving the bench away with the heel of her foot and grabbing Chloe by the hips, pushing her around until her butt hits the edge of the piano keys and fills the space with an unappealing shriek of mismatched notes. Beca takes her hands back then, just long enough to pull her shirt the rest of the way off and toss it close by behind her, and then in a moment borne from blind arousal, she's **lifting** Chloe. Granted, the redhead's little hop aids the effort, but it does nothing to stop the pleased little "oh" from making its way past her lips. Lips that are immediately covered, caught, teased apart. She trails her hands up from Beca's elbows to her shoulders and back again, enjoying the feel of goosebumps erupting across her skin. She nips at Beca's bottom lip, then sucks at it to sooth the sting, and Beca's fingers slide beneath the hem of Chloe's dress, travelling over the taut muscles of her thighs until they reach the material of her underwear.

"Spread 'em, Beale." Beca hears Chloe's breath catch but feels her comply, knees brushing the front of Beca's body as she slides her legs apart and Beca wraps one arm around Chloe's backside beneath the dress. Then it's a small shift of cotton and an inching of her hand; Beca exhales in a loud whoosh of air as her fingers slip through slick heat and Chloe cants her hips forward with a whimper.

And she doesn't think about the fact that Aubrey could walk in at any moment, or that **anyone** could waltz in and catch them – or she doesn't **really** think about those things, or how those things might drive her movements, might make them a little more frantic, a little more desperate – or that if Aubrey finds out they did it on the piano, Beca will probably end up strapped to it as it's rolled off the edge of a cliff.

No, she doesn't think about that. All that Beca thinks of, focuses on, is the way Chloe's arms fly around her neck, the way they pull her close and cling as Beca slips into her. The way Chloe cries out before Beca can smother the sound with a kiss. The way Chloe **feels** , moving into her, clenching around her, kissing her until she can't concentrate on Beca's mouth anymore. Beca feels her chest expand as Chloe's nails sink into the skin at her shoulders, at the way she mutters watered-down curse words against Beca's lips, like someone is inflating a balloon behind her ribcage.

Eyes closed, she moves her fingers to the rhythm inside her head, thumping and fast, the beat harder than either of them usually enjoy, but Chloe's hands are moving over her like she doesn't know what to do with them anymore and Beca knows that it's okay. New, but okay. That it's good.

On either side of her, Chloe's legs shift like she's trying to gain leverage. One finds it on the edge of the keys and it's Beca's turn to jump at the noise, but Chloe doesn't seem to have heard it. Her heel slips off, jerking her body, and she nearly chokes on her moan as Beca curls the tips of her fingers as she withdraws them. Chloe's hands finally still, gripping and pushing down on Beca's shoulders in the same endless movement, and Beca blinks open her eyes to watch the shape of Chloe's mouth change as it curves around a wordless cry. She doesn't break from her rhythm, doesn't stray from the beat, and after a muttered and always unexpected – though perfectly formed, in Beca's opinion - "fuck" that sends a thrill through her, she feels Chloe tense against the arm Beca has wound around her. Chloe takes her lip between her teeth and bites down. Beca feels her brow furrow against her forehead and Chloe gives one final, short-lived thrust of her hips as she unravels around her.

Beca slows her movements, still keeping to a beat, but one that's easier to follow. Come-down music. She stops when Chloe's hold on her slackens and can't help but chuckle at the whimper Chloe lets out when she draws her hand out from under the dress. After a few seconds, Chloe sleepily blinks her eyes open and finds herself face to face with a smirking Beca Mitchell.

"How's that for a surprise?" Chloe's reply is a laugh, weak and rough, but oh so real.

"You sure showed me," she hums, pressing a kiss to Beca's lips that starts chaste, but quickly slips into something far beyond and Beca forces herself to break away, taking one step backward in an attempt to stop herself from falling forward again.

"We," she points a finger at Chloe, "have tested Fate enough for one day. The girls are going to be here any minute." Chloe heaves a dramatic sigh and hops down off the piano as Beca turns to grab her shirt. Then, sidling up behind the brunette, Chloe wraps her arms around a slender waist, pressing a kiss to her bare shoulder.

"We should test it again some time," she says, lips still touching Beca's skin, and Beca turns in her arms to raise an eyebrow at her.

"Really? Already?" Chloe shrugs, pecking her on the lips.

"I'm insatiable." She steals another kiss as Beca rolls her eyes, chuckling at the way she tries to playfully escape Chloe's hold only to find herself pressed tighter to her.

"Oh god," Aubrey's voice slices through the moment and Beca's head snaps in the direction of her voice, "can't you keep it in your pants for five minutes?" Chloe's attention doesn't stray though, remains fixed on Beca's profile as she presses a kiss to her cheek.

"Jealousy is so not your colour," Beca remarks bitingly, catching the full brunt of a 'Posen glare' and refusing to be moved under the weight of it.

"Both of you be nice." Chloe's pout is enough to placate the pair of them and she drops her arms away from Beca, but grabs her hand, entwining their fingers and tugging her over to where the blonde is.

"Whatever," Aubrey waves a hand at them, dropping a pile of papers onto a chair before immediately picking up one of the whiteboard pens and starting to write. "Just don't have sex on the piano." Beca barks a laugh and Aubrey spins to face them as they take their seats. Straightening her face, Beca draws a cross over her heart.

"Promise." Chloe spends the next hour and a half shooting her secretive smiles across the room.


End file.
